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After the maelstrom of celebrity-led openings that was October, November is a very low-key month for London theatre, with a quiet first couple of weeks picking up as they give way to the beginnings of the Christmas season and the first pantos of the year. Which is no problem – there are still dozens of openings, and the slight decrease in massive shows means we can recommend a few of the month’s quirkier offerings.
1. The Importance of Being Earnest
Oscar Wilde’s most famous play has gone untouched by London’s major subsidised theatres for decades – not because The Importance of Being Earnest is viewed as a terrible play, but because it looms so large over British culture that the very act of staging it feels like a cliche. And, of course, there’s inevitably a new commercial production every few years. But suddenly, this feels right: with current Doctor Who star Ncuti Gatawa leading the cast, crack support from the likes of Sharon D Clarke as the formidable Lady Bracknell, innovative director Max Webster at the helm and a retina-searingly pink, ultra-knowing aesthetic in the promo pictures, the NT’s big Christmas revival just looks massively fun and like it’ll find a fresh angle on Wilde’s society romp.
National Theatre, Nov 21-Jan 25 2025.
2. The Devil Wears Prada
An Elton John-penned musical adaptation of the acerbic millennial fashion mag comedy sounds like a dream come true. In fact the first incarnation of The Devil Wears Prada had a rocky time of it – delayed by the pandemic and then deemed ‘not ready’ by John after a tryout 2022 run in Chicago. So they’ve started again from scratch and after a summer run in Plymouth, the West End’s huge Dominion Theatre is the first to get the new-look show. Will it capture the film’s magic? There’s only one way to find out! But certainly there’s some satisfying casting, with erstwhile Desperate Housewife Vanessa Williams stepping into the Meryl Streep role of tyrannical fashion editor Miranda Priestley.
Dominion Theatre, booking to May 31 2025. Book tickets here.
3. Sh!t Theatre: Or What’s Left of Us
By far the best thing I saw at this year’s Edinburgh Festival Fringe was the new show from gleefully shambolic, angel-voiced art duo Sh!t Theatre. The important thing to know about Rebecca Biscuit and Louise Mothersole is that they are very clever, very funny, and all their shows are about things that sound ridiculous on paper but tend to be weirdly powerful in practice. Or What’s Left of Us is an account of the duo getting into folk music as a means to distract themselves from terrible loss. It starts out very funny, and ends in total devastation – extraordinary work.
Soho Theatre, Nov 18-30.
4. Aladdin
Oh yes it is! The second half of November means pantomime season is underway in London and while nobody is more freaked out about this than me, the fact is that – to borrow a phrase – winter is coming. There are about a million different London pantos, but the Lyric Hammersmiths’ is always first out of the traps and generally one of the seasons’ best, with a spikier, punkier attitude than some of the more bland celebrity-driven affairs.
Lyric Hammersmith, Nov 16-Jan 5 2025. Buy tickets here.
5. Jack and the Beanstalk: What a Whopper!
London has a teeming gay panto scene, but in recent years one has clearly established itself as the flagship show of the festive season: Jon Bradfield and Andrew Beckett’s seasonal extravaganzas started life at the teeny, now-defunct Above the Stag, but its closure ended up propelling the panto to the much larger Charing Cross Theatre where it’s settled in very nicely. The shows are smutty, camp, and inappropriate for children, but also sturdy works of Proper Theatre made by a team who have long honed their craft.
Charing Cross Theatre, Nov 23-Jan 11 2025.
6. The Curious Case of Benjamin Button
Jethro Compton’s musical adaptation of F Scott Fitzgerald’s short story about a man who ages in reverse is very much its own thing, with the action relocated to the wilds of rural Cornwall, and the music a beautifully ramshackle folk opera. It’s a real homegrown, slow-burner success story as well – following two seasons at Southwark Playhouse, it finally hits the West End, with Olivier-winner John Dalgleish as Benjamin and Clare Foster as his extremely complicated love interest Elowen Keene.
Ambassadors Theatre, booking to Feb 15 2025. Buy tickets here.
7. The Lightning Thief: The Percy Jackson Musical
A cult success in the US, The Lightning Thief is, of course, the musical adaptation of the first of Rick Riordan’s beloved books about son-of-Poseidon Percy and his demigod pals as they enjoy a series of mythical adventures in modern day New York. While it’ll be interesting to see how all the fantasy spectacle works on a modest budget, it certainly promises to be a fun addition to the festive season for tweens and teens.
The Other Palace, Nov 23-Feb 2 2025. Buy tickets here.
8. All’s Well That Ends Well
The Globe’s indoor season gets underway this month with a rare outing for Shakespeare’s eccentric late ‘comedy’ All’s Well That Ends Well, which concerns Helen, a young woman who saves the King of France’s life, is promised the hand of any man she wants, and goes to what might best be described as ‘extraordinary lengths’ when the object of her affections Bertram makes it clear he wants nothing to do with her. With a morality hardly compatible with the present, it’ll be fascinating to see what Chelsea Walker’s production does with it.
Shakespeare’s Globe, Nov 8-Jan 4 2025. Buy tickets here.
9. Blood Show
Leftfield theatremaker Ocean Chillingworth has been mining a rich seam of weird and imaginative work for years now. Blood Show is their biggest work to date under their own name, and sounds luridly fascinating – two actors fighting for an hour, aided by 75 litres of stage blood per show. We’ll get back to you on what it all means when we’ve seen it.
Battersea Arts Centre, Nov 12-23.
10. The Glorious French Revolution (or: Why Sometimes it Takes a Guillotine to Get Anything Done)
The biggest show to date from acclaimed Fringe company YESYESNONO, The Glorious French Revolution is a provocative new show that looks at whether La Terreur was worth it and dares to provocatively dream about what would happen if we chopped the heads of our modern day aristocrats.
New Diorama Theatre, Nov 14-Dec 14.